Political analysis and commentary shaping the progressive debate in Aotearoa New Zealand, focused on power, policy, and accountability.
Nothing could be more helpful to the cause of the Right than a Left which has lost its faith in the people. What, after all, is more likely to cause the people to lose faith in the Left than a nagging suspicion that their self-appointed liberators regard them as being either too vicious or too stupid to grasp the arguments in favour of individual freedom and social justice without instruction from above?
In this environment progressive New Zealanders must fight for free speech in every arena possible but this does not include defending “rights” of anyone to promote racist or religious hatred which smooths the path to fascism.
There is a mountain of good research evidence that placing women in prison causes undue harm to their families and children. Most children end up living with extended family (few are looked after by the father), often grandparents. The children are often traumatised. There is little therapy, counselling or other support for the children. They are vulnerable to poor health outcomes and poor education outcomes.
This week a range of environmental group representatives, fishing company agents, scientists, consultants and international experts gathered in Wellington to review the threats facing Maui and Hector’s dolphins. The meeting was organised by DoC and Fisheries NZ and participants had to agree to Terms of Reference which included a clause saying they wouldn’t talk to the media about the proceedings.
Condemnation of Israel’s most recent act of destruction in the Palestinian village of Khan al-Ahmar was expressed on 4 July this year by the European Union and the United Nations. Since the 1950s the Jahalin Bedouin community’s homes, schools and livelihoods have been under constant threat by the Israel. As one villager, Tahreer Abu Dahouk, a mother of four children all aged under ten years, put it: “we sleep afraid, wake afraid”.
Recently, upon arriving in Eugene, Oregon a taxi driver told me a story which sums up America`s incivility today. A prospective customer, with avowed pro-Trump sentiments was about to enter the vehicle. When the driver, part Hispanic but Caucasian looking, gave an opposite view the customer walked away. Avoiding the company of an anti-Trump liberal was well worth the inconvenience of a delayed journey.
IT HAS BEEN DISPIRITING, this past week, to learn how little people who consider themselves leftists know about fascism.
GOLRIZ GHARAMAN, the Greens’ defence spokesperson has castigated her coalition partners for purchasing four Boeing P-8 maritime surveillance aircraft to replace the Air Force’s ageing fleet of Orions. Her stance is more-or-less in keeping with the Green Party’s pacifist leanings, but Gharaman’s objections to the aircraft’s war-fighting capabilities raises the more interesting question of why the party needs a defence spokesperson at all?
Veteran human rights campaigner and union leader, Mike Treen, is about to join the 2018 international Freedom Flotilla determined to challenge Israel’s 11-year inhumane naval blockade of Gaza later this month.
For most women, having babies causes huge struggles – to cope financially with only paid parental leave for a period, to have partners often having to work longer hours to make ends meet, to face losing seniority when returning to the workforce, or losing out on promotions etc. There is still a tension between babies and workplaces in New Zealand. These do not abate as the babies grow older – they get worse.
